Activision gets a nice check from Sony. This offsets risk the game is a clunker. It also helps pay dev costs, which might make it a better game. The downside is by the time it makes it to other platforms its a year old. That might hurt sales there, but Activision must not think its going to hurt that much given the franchise.

Crash Bandicoot is a Playstation icon. Its totally fitting to be exclusive to Playstation. Being just a timed exclusive will eventually allow old fans who changed lanes to an Xbox to eventually play it, but at the penalty of a long wait.

Sony gets time alone with Crash, and can hype the game knowing its not helping their competition. Being an exclusive, timed or not, will help the game get some hype too. It will also help define the PS4 against the XB1 a bit. Sony has now put skin in the game that its a good game too. I am more surprised its not a strict PS4 exclusive.